Post on 07-Mar-2016
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DAMIAN PAUL HARRIS
This exhibition at Vientiane Gallery, the first solo show by Tasmanian-
born, Sydney-based artist Damian Harris, focuses on the ways in which
water refracts light, reflects beauty and distorts realism. His earlier
expressionistic, graffiti-inspired canvases have made a stylistic shift
towards images of greater realism, although these are often distorted
by shimmering reflections and water-ripples. The light flashes off the
surface of lakes, streams and oceans. Some of his canvases are
calmly contemplative, while others are characterized by lush, sinuous
line-work.
Harris covers the whole surface of each canvas with detail, sometimes
recalling eastern calligraphy, or what the artist calls “my experiments
with impressionism.” Water is shown as a constantly changing surface,
variously depicting reflections of a wooden pier in Queensland, an
overhanging tree in Sydney’s Centennial park, the rippling effects
caused by a platypus coming up for air in a Tasmanian stream, the
surge of an ocean swell, or the hedonism of a friend swimming
underwater in a pool on a summer’s weekend.
“These paintings are not so much about place, but about looking at
water, zooming in on the abstract surface and reflections,” says Harris.
“In contemporary art, landscape is not boring, it’s not banal. But
sometimes it’s a technical struggle, to correctly paint the sense of flow.
I want to challenge the conservative attitude of traditional landscape
painting. I paint using images taken with a digital camera, helping me
to discover details that might not be immediately obvious to the naked
eye. When water is moving, you don’t grasp many of its intricacies and
shapes. So, to get my priorities right, I have to stop, stand back, and
look at nature. Maybe it’s a reaction to the information age, to try to
find something exceptional in water, an ordinary, basic element.”
For the past few years, Harris has concentrated on landscapes and
portraits, with many paintings of his friends from Australia’s acting and
musical worlds, including Chrissie Amphlett, Nicholas Eadie, John
Howard (the actor, not the ex-P.M.), Garry Scale, Carol Skinner and
Oscar-nominated Jacki Weaver, and his series of portraits of the Dalai
Lama as a small boy, standing uncertainly in oversized, warm clothes.
But Harris simultaneously creates works in different techniques and
styles, in several artistic languages. His primitive, expressionistic
canvases, peopled by stick-figures and graffiti-style slogans are his
comment on urban life and the human condition. He takes on a different
discipline in his textual pieces, a sort of “anti-branding” composed of
altered business logos, typography and cryptic social phrases – Home
A Loan, Mess Age, Passive Fist, Sleepworking.
“Both politically and economically, some things are wrong, right now,”
says Harris. “These small phrases and new words are my mini-protests
on canvas”.
Harris’s Waterworks have a more subtle conceptual edge. “I also look at
the visual impact beyond the natural representation of water. The way it
suggests other things than what it really is, like when you look at clouds
and see the shapes of animals or other objects. Or all the bizarre
shapes made by the reflections of overhanging tree-branches on a late
afternoon, with hardly any wind, and a surface like silk.”
Mixing hard-edge with soft focus, Damian Harris paints the connection
between two ways of looking, incorporating both realism and
abstraction, capturing the flatness of water as being a surface full of
movement and vitality.
Jonathan Turner
p r esen ted by Jona than Tur ner MED IA RELEASE
Born 1964 in Hobart, Tasmania. Lives and
works in Sydney.
Education Tasmanian School of Art - Bachelor
of Fine Art 1985-87
Studio residency Gasworks, Albert Park,
Melbourne 1990-91
Worked in the animation industry 1993-2001,
with advertisements created for KFC, Bodalla,
Kelloggs, Streets Ice-cream, CocaCola,
Clearasil, Sanitarium, Claratyne and Arnotts;
children’s TV series including Crocadoo,
Bananas in Pyjamas, Petals, Lucky Lydia and
Mr Baby; the movie All Dogs go to Heaven
(part 2): the music video Gorillas, and the
independent project Tod and Tom.
www.damianpaulharris.com
EXHIBITION OPENING
Friday, March 9, 2012
5.30 pm to 7.30 pm
Exhibition runs through
April 7, 2012
Exhibitions
Solo show
2012 Waterworks - Vientiane, Sydney
Group shows
2011 Flood Relief – Blackwattle Café,
Glebe, Sydney
2009 Reflections of Australia - Hon-
grun Huaxia Hotel, Zhengzhou, Henan
Province, China
2006 The Dunlop Ping-Pong Project -
Blank Space Gallery, Sydney
2005 Guttersnipe Project - Kings Cross
Library, Sydney
1996 Group Show – Tap Gallery, Sydney
1987 Drawing - Centre for the Arts,
Hobart, Tasmania
Vientiane
Shop 1A, 1-11 Oxford Street, Paddington
(corner South Dowling Street and Oxford
Street, opposite the Beauchamp Hotel)
Vientiane opening hours:
Wed-Fri 12pm-3pm,
Mon-Sat 6.30pm-9.30 pm.
Exhibition runs through April 7
Vientiane - Experience Lao cuisine
www.bamboostickyrice.com
Facebook: Vientiane Gallery/Restaurant
Tel: 02 93807414
Flyer design by Jenny McClatchey: jen_mcclatchey@hotmail.com
BANGALOW 1 (2009) acrylic on canvas, 122 x 92 cm